Meta Platforms Inc META is forcing its rivals to reveal some of their most closely held secrets to protect them from the federal government, Bloomberg reports.
Facebook’s parent company has subpoenaed 132 companies for documents, including Snap Inc SNAP, ByteDance Ltd’s TIK Tok, Match Group, Inc MTCH, Twitter Inc TWTR, Reddit Inc, Oracle Corp ORCL, Microsoft Corp MSFT LinkedIn and audio start Cluband has warned that it may seek information from 100 more.
Rivals accused Meta of using antitrust litigation to obtain their private data.
The US Federal Trade Commission prosecuted Meta in 2020 for allegedly cornering the social networking market in part through its acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp.
Meta had denied the allegations, arguing that the market was constantly evolving with newcomers like TikTok and Clubhouse.
Meta’s request seeks “materials about every product and nearly every aspect of Snap’s business, with a time span spanning nearly Snap’s entire existence,” the lawyers said.
TikTok was concerned about Meta copying features and tactics with the requested information. Pinterest, LinkedIn and others had expressed concerns about Meta’s “highly invasive” requests, which they said required their “most sensitive competitive documents.”
Meta also requested information from SoftBank Corp SFTBY owned Line Corpmessaging service in Japan Naver Corp and the Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten Group Inc RCONFwhich owns the Viber messaging app.
Separately, analysts predicted more downside for Snap and Meta as competition and budgets weighed. Piper Sandler found the change in Apple Inc AAPL the operating system making it difficult for apps to track user activity on the iPhone and iPad means Snap and Meta will continue to lag behind.
Price Action: Shares of META traded 6.95% lower at $157.19 in late check on Tuesday.
